Mayweather will fight Miguel Cotto on May 5 at Las Vegas' MGM Grand Garden after Nevada's athletic commissioners granted him a conditional license for one fight before he goes to jail in June.

Mayweather (42-0, 26 KOs) chose Cotto (36-2, 29 KOs), the respected Puerto Rican champion, as his next opponent only after failing to land a date with Pacquiao, the superstar Filipino congressman. The two sides have discussed what's likely to be the most lucrative fight in boxing history for nearly three years without reaching a deal.

"I presented Pacquiao with the fight," Mayweather said after meeting with the Nevada commission. "Pacquiao is blowing a lot of smoke. ... He doesn't really want to fight. I gave him a chance to step up to the plate. We're talking about a $10 million fighter that I tried to give $40 million to. We didn't even talk about the back end."

While Mayweather once appeared to be uninterested in the bout, he's now very interested - but Pacquiao's interest appears to have cooled. Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum repeatedly discounted the possibility of making the fight in recent weeks.

Mayweather and Pacquiao are boxing's top two stars, and they have taunted each other with jabs including a posting on Twitter on Wednesday in which Mayweather referred to the Filipino star as "Miss Pac Man." They also have a defamation lawsuit pending in federal court in Las Vegas stemming from Mayweather's accusations that Pacquiao took performance-enhancing drugs.

"He's ducking and dodging me," Mayweather said of Pacquiao. "He really didn't want to fight from the beginning. He got famous basically by piggybacking off my name. When you mention Floyd Mayweather, man, you mention an all-time great, an icon in the sport of boxing. When you mention Manny Pacquiao, they say, `Oh, that's the guy who's trying to fight Floyd Mayweather.' When it's all said and done, all the guy did is just piggyback off my name."

Mayweather will take on Cotto at 154 pounds, a move up from the longtime welterweight's past four fights. Mayweather, who beat Oscar De La Hoya at super welterweight in 2007, beat Victor Ortiz last September to win the WBC welterweight title.

Before getting his license on a 5-0 vote, Mayweather got a lecture from Nevada athletic commissioners.

They told the fighter, his manager-promoter and his lawyer they want a prefight report May 1 to ensure Mayweather abides by conditions set by a Nevada judge in a criminal domestic violence case. He will begin serving 90 days in jail June 1, but is likely to serve only about 60.

Commission Chairman Raymond "Skip" Avansino Jr. said it would be a "tragedy" if Mayweather didn't meet the requirements to make the multimillion-dollar Cinco de Mayo bout. Mayweather received a temporary reprieve on his short jail sentence last month so he could fight on a traditionally huge weekend for boxing in Las Vegas.